Ilyushin IL-2 Sturmovik as A FIGHTER!
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- Опубліковано 4 лис 2023
- A lot of attack type aircraft were used as fighters in a pinch, the IL-2 included. However the IL-2 was actually pretty decent in this role within certain limitations. I hope you like the video.
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When I used to play IL-2 1946 online years ago, there was a server that had a very early eastern front map where I would sometimes use the Sturmovik as a fighter. I would load it as lightly as possible, and it worked pretty well. I had someone once sending me chat messages saying "You aren't supposed to use it that way!" - I guess they were wrong!
Now adays free videos online are better than any multi-million dollar show on TV. Sad.
If not multirole why bother
Well, against anything that isn't a figher, the IL-2 is basically a heavy fighter :)
When I was in US Air Force intel, I met an older fighter pilot who insisted that wing loading was the only factor that he needed to learn about Soviet aircraft. This was after the F-15 and F-16 had entered service, so even professionals sometimes fall into the trap of over-rating the wing loading of fighters.
like always germans....still being the source for anything 😮
IL-2 was horrible on maintaining the energy after a shallow dive. Which was the main battle tactic for the ground attacks used by the plane. IL-2 needed two turns to regain the initial altitude (usually about 500 m) in case the second attempt was needed. So, I guess, any vertical maneuver in a dog fight was out of the question.
LaGG-3 in reality, not just on documents had empty weights all over the place. It was resin impegrated wood structured plane. How much resin these workers compared to those over there used, varied wildly and easily made 100kg difference. By La5/LA5FN Soviets got specs and factory worker much better on line.
The Japanese used the Aichi D3A as combat air patrol at times for the IJN, so sometimes people just do what they need to do. My father trained on the Mig 23 in the late 1980s but then retrained to do air to ground in the Mig 27 which seemed mostly the same airplane.
Il-2 pilots developed some pretty cool tactics, like the circle of death where, upon the arrival of enemy fighters, the il-2s would form a large circle so no enemy fighter could get on the tail of one without being blasted out of the sky itself
5:53
I am gobsmacked, sir, by the weight of information you dropped upon me on an underreported subject. Thank you!
Fighter pilots have long lived by the adage "rate kills", and this was a good explanation of why. Speed is life was the other adage, and that was the priority in fighter design.
Nicely done, as usual, Greg. The Sturmovik is a very interesting aircraft - in some ways not that far from being an eastern front prototype for the current A-10, which is also slow by military jet standards, but carries "the gun" as well as hard points for a host of external weapons. Because my dad put a 500 lb. S.A.P. bomb into a Japanese carrier during the Battle of Leyte Gulf while flying an F6F-5, and lived to tell the tale, the Navy must have decided he had some skill at that task, so after VF-19's combat tour was over, his next assignment was to VBF-150, flying F4U-4s. He spent most of 1945 training in that plane for not only aerial combat, but also for what I assume would have been ground support missions during the proposed invasion of Japan (Operation Downfall), which never took place. The Corsair was obviously a competent fighter plane in 1945, but its long service life for the U.S. Navy, into the jet era and the Korean War, seems to me largely due to its abilities as a ground attack aircraft with heavy firepower and the ability to carry, for its size, a LOT of exterior stores (a navalized A-10, if you will). I think it interesting that even the Navy designated the Corsair as a "bomber-fighter" at the end of WW 2 (hence the "VBF" label for his squadron of Corsairs), rather than "fighter-bomber," which would have been "VFB" in naval parlance, or perhaps just the existing "VF" letters before the squadron number.
If you’re going to bring up the concept of “Bomber Fighter” at some point, I imagine the SBD is going to be a mandatory call-in as well. You mentioned the incident with Swede, but it should be noted that he was in the AO specifically on an Air to Air mission. Not to hunt ZEROs, mind you, just Japanese bombers, but it was good enough at this that it’s one of the only bombers in WWII to CLAIM a positive Victory Ratio.
In gunfighter battles, speed, acceleration, rate of climb, and ceiling were king. Saburo Sakai described F6Fs flying past him 100 knots faster than his A6M was, and he had no chance to do anything but evade.
That not an il2 "L", but probably kirilic letter "I"- И the capital i
Greg, I once heard that the FW190 could routinely carry the luftwaffe's heaviest bomb. A 1.8 ton ordnance (I think called the SC1800), which had to have its lower fin cropped to achieve ground clearance. Extraordinary effort, especially from one of the smallest fighters of WW2, operating from unpaved forward strips. I would love to see some comparisons here between bombloads especially between the IL2 and FW190 and an opinion as to which actually was (as you suggest) the better ground attack aircraft. That would be fascinating!
Hey Greg, I've watched a bunch of your great videos. I had a career as a pilot of light fixed wing and helicopters, and a semester as a ground instructor. I much admire your grasp of math and the charts. I remember being in the back seat of a Super Cub when we got "bounced" by our buddies in a Pitts S-2. The cub could turn insides the Pitts all day, and the simulated ak- ak -ak -ak over the radio confirmed the Cub as the winner. Great fun. I love the Sturmovik. I had a model of the "cement plane" on skis when I was a kid. Thanks!!
Yes ! The Eastern front was the major theater of conflict . And yet so little factual accounts exist . Love that you are covering this.